Dinosaurs Galore

I know it's quite a while ago now but I still want to do a post about it because it was a very important event.  After much discussion we decided on a Dinosaur Golf  party.  This time we decided to share the party with a boy in his class, Thomas, which was practical because we could share the cost and the work load.  It worked out perfectly because it meant the boys had a focused putt-putt activity for an hour and we had the dinosaur theme to work with!

The Birthday Boys

The invitation

The venue provided a nice enough invitation so we didn't have to make our own personalised one this year.  It's a pity because we actually like designing a special one but at least it saved some time!

The Cake

There are lots of dinosaur cake ideas out there but they tend to be timid and baby-ish looking.  Nicholas wanted something fierce like a t-rex of course.  After a lot of digging around I found an idea but we needed to use our own creativity to make it work.  Dad was brilliant at sculpting and icing the cake even though the icing was a bit runny (note to self: avoid ASDA food colouring even if it is the only shop that is open at 10pm at night).  I think this time the end result far exceeded everyone's expectations!

The party food

We went for the easy option and did pizzas.  For the carnivores we had cocktail sausages and for the herbivores we had colourful crudites of carrot, cucumber and red pepper.  Oh, and of course, monster munch chips (aka dinosaur foot prints).  For the fruit I made this cool dinosaur head out of a water melon and filled it with a selection of different colourful fruits.  It looked great and I was pleasantly surprised when the boys demolished it!

The Party Sweets

We had dinosaur bones made with pretzel sticks with mini-marshmallows on each side dipped into white chocolate.  Warning: it is very time consuming but the boys had great fun helping and eating the flops!

We also had dinosaur nests which were cupcake baskets containing chocolate covered cornflakes and topped with a little candy egg.  Thomas' mum made these great nests!

We also found some mini chocolate biscuits in the shape of dinosaurs and tubs of candy floss disguised as volcanic dust.  These went down a treat too.

Extra bits and bobs

We tried to bury little plastic dinosaurs in a kind of home made clay.  It was a horrible flop and never set but the boys enjoyed getting messy anyway.  After washing off the mulch I came up with a different use for them.  We put them into balloons which we released in the room after the feast to fuel the chaos.  The boys went berserk trying to pop the balloons to get the dinosaurs out.  We also had some cool dinosaur hand tattoos for a bit of extra entertainment!

The party bags

We kept the party bags really simple because there were so many other little treats weaved into the actual party including a pinata packed with goodies.  Basically each boy got a paper bag decorated with dinosaur stickers containing one of the Dinosaur Cove books.  I do like giving meaningful party favours.